New dash - Rough costs?

[Johnniem]

My cherished Chim is in desperate need of a new interior and I thought I would start with the dash. I am in SE london and was wondering if anyone knew of a good place to go to get this done (absolutely no chance of me doing it myself! Complete numptie when it comes to things like that!).

I would probably go for the traditional veneer but also have no idea of the likely cost for a complete remove and install.

Any ideas chaps? Feel free to pm me if that suits better. Thanks to all responders!

JohnnieM

[Goodwin]

Co-incidentally I was talking to the Racing Green guys about the same thing today. For a Leven Stainless steel dash plus all labour etc they estimated £600 - £700. Most of the cost is labour associated with swapping all the lights, hater dials etc. the dash itself is about £150 - £200 depending.

[Excitedoldgeezer]

Did it myself £20 for veneer, £20 for varnish and stain, 6 weekends pratting about doing it, although the finished article looks fantastic, I can now understand the reason why labour is so high.

[tvrdavid]

Did mine a few years ago for pennies as well. It can be a sod to get the dash off but it's definitely a DIY job. James at TVR MADS usually advertises newly veneered dashes if you dont fancy it yourself but in terms of removal and refit I'd try it yourself and save the cash.

[Alexdaredevilz]

Did mine in a black suede cost £20 for material and glue, and took about 2 hours

[Johnniem]

Thanks Goodwin, just what I was looking for. Doing it yourself and having the car off the road for six weeks is exactly my point. 12weeks and a bill for someone else to properly finish it off is what I want to avoid! Cheers.

[M@H]

What The ????

Doing the dash swap is very strightforward and can be achieved in an afternoon !!

Undo the dash top bolts (ten to fifteen minutes (search on here for descriptions of their wherabouts) - or two minutes if you know where they are)

Lift dash top clear and raise up the dash panel (1 minute)

Undo the small screws holding the heater dials in place and rest to onse side (2 minutes)

Starting from one end and one at a time, remove the two / three / four cables from each dial and pull out the bulb holder - undo the sscuring nuts for the dial and pull it through the front of the dash then refit cables (doing one "clock" ate at a time and re-fitting the cables means you don't end up with loads of cables everywhere that you don't know what they came from) keep an eye out for the black elastic sealing rings ('lacky bands) as they may be slightly stuck to the dash and the guage (3-4 minutes per dial)

Remove central indicator light assembly (between main dials) by undoing retaining nut (1 minute)

Potential Fiddly bit - the MIL light (and one other I cant remember) has some small feed cables - either carefully cut the cables (and re-join later), manage to remove the LED from the holder (depending on original adhesive waxy stuff), or use a soldering iron to unsolder them temporarily (5-10 minutes)

Now reomve old dash plate entirely from the car (30 seconds) - For fun you can start the car and check all the dials are still working - remember their bodiaes are earth though so check what they are sitting on (also check that the internal guage lightbulbs are all still lit)

Next press out the little aluminium light holders (5-15 minutes depending on how rusty and stubborn the circlips are) from the old dash panel.

Note - if the new panel does not have a thin threaded bar on it for the central indicator light assembly, you should have araldite'd one on it the night before (or you could use something fast setting at the time of course) a long bolt will do it.

Get new panel and re-fit the aluminium light holders just removed (5-10 minutes depending on if the circlips got mangled on the previous step.

Start at the one end (right, by the pillar makes sense) and refit each dial by removing the wires, sliding dial guage through the dash panel and re-attaching wires (3-4 minutes a dial)

Re-attach central indicator light assembly and MIL light (and the other one !?) (2 minutes)

Re-attach the heater cable assembly - 2-3 minutes (you may need to scavenve the "trinagles" from the old dash depenging on design of the new one (add five minutes)

Slot new dash panel in place into the lower dash above the steering wheel (30 seconds)

Re-fit dash top (10-15 minutes of fiddling to ensure the slots in the top of the dash panel are in the right place and the whole thing goes back in nicely.

So all in its 2-3 hours work - I'd struggle to pay someone £500 to do it !

Cheers,
Matt.

Edited by M@H on Monday 16th May 16:29

Edited by M@H on Monday 16th May 16:31

[kenny.R400]

110 quid for a Leven dash swap including a change of all bulbs at the same time. I'd never done this before but a quick ask on here and a scour of the archives revealed the only problem I'd encounter was the missing third bolt ..........once I'd found that little fecker it was simple.

TVRless Kenny

[M@H]

Was that the missing left hand rear one, right hand one or the one in the middle up beyond under the map holder ?

[kenny.R400]

It was the one up near the vent on the drivers side.................thought I'd got it first go and gave a big "EURIKA I've pissed it in 3 minutes" shout.................then me bonnet release knob fell off

[Johnniem]

Thanks for that M@H. This only leads me to believe that if this is such a simple job then why are TVR garages charging £600-£700 for a new dash, especially if the actual dash only costs a couple of hundred quids? I much appreciate your listing the way to do it. Thanks again.